OMG y’all are so my people. SO excellent to see you here. This is me when I was a nun. I wasn’t a great nun. You can hear me talking about it on Jonathan Van Ness’ podcast. Or over coffee. It was an interesting experience. If you’d like to chat about how I disappointed Mother Teresa, book me and we can chat. Or really you can text me (215.964.1963) and I’ll talk about it for free.
Let me know if you see something below that might meet your needs. Also, I’m a nurse and the author of How to Survive and Maybe Even Love Nursing School so check with the school of nursing to see if they’ll cosponsor. Ideas here. Plus because it’s 2024, I’m offering every LGBT group that needs it a sliding scale. We need to look out for each other.
And if you need to pass it along to the other students on the committee, it’s probably easiest just to download this PDF.
EXPERIENCES FOR THIS MOMENT:
(This is just a quick summary, if you want me to come to campus but need something specific, let’s talk)
OUR GOD IS A NONBINARY GOD: BRINGING THE GIFT OF BOTH/AND TO AN EITHER/OR WORLD [PERFORMANCE WITH TALKBACK OR WORKSHOP] In this hilarious and inspirational keynote, nonbinary transmasculine comedian Kelli Dunham who was kicked out of Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity for “having too much self-esteem,” leads the participants through a dizzying multimedia exploration of the ways in which enforcement of the rigid gender binary, heterosexism and over the top toxic masculinity has impacted the world at large and people of faith in particular. Drawing on her nun-to-queer comic journey for inspiration, Kelli suggests a solution: a joyful worldwide gender repeal party hosted by the LGBT community and our allies, where we address what divides us and shift our focus to pressing matters, for example, rescuing the planet from certain death. In a moment when the LGBT people in the Church are being used as a wedge, Kelli proposes how we can be the gift of a bridge instead.
SECOND HELPING: A PRACTICAL TRAGICOMEDY [PERFORMANCE WITH TALKBACK OR WORKSHOP] Kelli Dunham grew up the youngest child in a large Midwestern US farm family that taught self-reliance as a religion.. When Kelli lost not one but two partners in a row to cancer, and then was the victim of a knee replacement gone very wrong, she was forced to start making different choices. Kelli recently returned from a month-long engagement at the Edinburgh Fringe, where SECOND HELPING was covered by BBC-4, BBC Scotland and the Sunday Times. In August, 2024 MSP Rona McKay convened a virtual conversation about medical aid in dying, using Kelli’s performance of SECOND HELPING as entry into the discussion.
FIGHT, FLIGHT, FREEZE, LAUGH As queerfolx with a history of trauma, we know there is nothing funny about what has happened to us, but we’re always looking for better tools to manage the emotional and logistical impact of our post-trauma response. Enter intentional humor, stage left. In this workshop, we’ll learn the capacity (and limits) of laughter in mitigating our fight, flight and freeze responses, pick up some handy exercises to use in our own lives, and have a surprisingly good time for a workshop about trauma!
HELP! I NEED SOMEBODY: THE QUEER ART OF ASKING FOR ASSISTANCE So many queer and transfolk are quick to help others but slow to accept help FROM others. In this workshop, we’ll consider how our help-receiving skills compare with our help-giving skills, discuss why it’s just as important to receive as to give, learn hands-on skills for becoming more comfortable with asking for help, and consider what mutual aid has to do with it all.
QUEER MEMOIR ON CAMPUS Tell your own story or someone will write it down, and sell it back to you, tarnished and unrecognizable! This workshop –using the same techniques and exercises Kelli has used in the production of the award-winning storytelling series Queer Memoir– will guide participants through writing prompts and brainstorming to help them create a compelling first-person narrative. The workshop includes Kelli’s guidance with creating a storytelling event if students want to share their work with a larger group.
GRIEF: YOU’RE NOT DOING IT WRONG Even before the pandemic, the LGBT community struggled with more than our share of grief. Now, in a health crisis that is becoming a grief crisis, how can we move forward? In this workshop, we’ll consider what skills we already have (as individuals and as a community) to support ourselves, our community, and the greater world, and what we still need to develop. How can we process our own individual grief within the context of so much loss for so many, and how can we stop feeling GUILTY for our own grief process?
WHY IS MY FAMILY HECKLING ME? Having families who can’t (or won’t) support our full, beautiful queerness is very serious business. But we can use humor to cope with their ridiculous words and behavior in plenty of ways. In this workshop (or interactive keynote), we’ll explore how humor–and specifically the lessons learned from stand-up comedy or improv–can help relieve stress, build resilience, and maybe even surprise your homophobic uncle with a great comeback at the next holiday celebration. You don’t have to consider yourself a “funny person” to participate in this workshop. It’s about discovering our own unique sense of humor. We’ll have fun, participants will leave with concrete skills for incorporating humor into our daily lives, and NO ONE will make you wear a clown nose, promise.